Putin has one last cruelty in mind for Mariupol

“The work of the armed forces to liberate Mariupol has been a success,” Vladimir Putin told Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu at a televised meeting last Thursday. “Congratulations”. But in reality, the Russian president has one last cruelty in mind.

The Russian spoke in the past of Mariupol, where Russian forces have reduced the strategic Ukrainian port to almost rubble, killing or injuring thousands of civilian residents. Of the 400,000 original inhabitants of Mariupol, perhaps 120,000 remain; most of the survivors managed to flee to other parts of Ukraine, but many have also been forcibly taken to Russia. However, he warns in an alarming editorial The Washington Post, the work of the Russian armed forces there is not quite finished.

A remnant of the city's defenders, estimated by Russia at around 2,000 fighters, is sheltered in the basements of a labyrinthine steel plant along the local coast. The Ukrainian authorities claim that there are “a few thousand” people settled in the fortress complex, but that the figure includes 500 wounded soldiers and 1,000 non-combatant civilians. This last category includes many children. Recognizing that it would be too risky for Russian troops to storm the site, even against an opponent outnumbered and outgunned, Putin ordered his forces not to continue to storm the plant, but to besiege it, so that “not even a fly could pass.”

In short, The Post denounces in the editorial, Putin's concern for the lives of his own men does not extend to the lives of those in the factory, who will die of disease, hunger or thirst if his siege - as it seems too likely - succeeds. Apparently determined to gain physical control, dead or alive, of both combatants and civilians trapped in the compound, Putin has demanded their surrender and has resisted Ukrainian calls for their evacuation to Ukrainian territory under the supervision of a third party. Until last Thursday, there had been no evacuation to Ukraine from Mariupol for weeks; that day, civilians - some 90 - managed to get safe in Zaporizhzhia.

“The United States, Europe and, indeed, every decent government in the world should demand that Russia face this catastrophe with humanity. That means negotiating something similar to the guaranteed evacuation proposed by the Ukrainians; if Russia does not allow that operation to be supervised by a third country, as Ukrainians have requested, a neutral agency, possibly the International Committee of the Red Cross, could be used,” the editorial demands.

However, defenders' ammunition and food are running out, and nothing in Putin's record, unfortunately, suggests that he would heed an appeal based on humanitarian concerns or international law.

Satellite photos show that his history includes the construction of mass graves, possibly large enough to house up to 9,000 civilians, the city's mayor denounced in a Telegram post.

Therefore, The Post claims, President Biden was right to announce new shipments of heavy artillery and drones to Ukraine, to help repel the new Russian offensive in the eastern Donbas region. It may be too late to convince Putin to avoid further unnecessary deaths in Mariupol; US-supplied weapons will allow Ukraine to address him in a language he does understand.

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